Friday, February 8, 2013

This past week has
been great, but it’s going to be quite monumental this coming week. On Friday
Feb 8th I hit my one year mark on my mission. WHAT! Some days I can't believe it’s
been a year already, other days not as much. But nonetheless it’s been a
fantastic year, by far one of the best years of my life. Looking back and see the changes I've made in
my life to grow and the experiences that have refined to get at the point where
I am. I give thanks to all my family, friends here in LA and at home who have
helped me and prayed for me. I'm excited to know that I still have another year
left to make an impact on the great people here in Los Angeles. The highlights of
this past week is on Tuesday we had a zone activity here some missionaries got
together to play sport and a little obstacle course game that the Zone Leaders
set up. I was nice to do as many Elders in the zone were going to move to
different areas the next day. Our zone did great work this past month, and
thing seem to keep looking better. On Wednesday we had a great lesson with a
couple Frank and Alicia again. We attempted to teach the Restoration to them
but something prompted us to focus more on their understanding of the gospel.
Frank shared with his life experiences that has helped him to God especially
after being in Jail for 15 years. Alicia talked about her brother who was a
drug addict who overdosed was dead for a week but stayed on life-support, came
back to life, fully recovered and now is a Christian pastor. They had so many
stories to share and I felt like we have gotten closer to us and trust us by
sharing those stories with us. It was a cool story how the Elders found them.
Well first, Alicia has a friend who is a member in Long Beach and for
Christmas, she invited Alicia and her husband to a Ward dinner. They enjoyed it
their time there, but no arrangements were made to send the missionaries to
teach them. Then on New Year’s Day, Elder Low and his companion before me,
Elder Harper, we driving up to the mission home to drop off Elder Harper,
because he was being sent home because of his health. Before heading up, he
told Elder Low he needed to tract one more street before he went home. They so happened
to knock on Frank and Alicia's door. They were stunned because they thought someone
from Long Beach sent the missionaries to them. We told this story to them and
they know that we are teaching them for a reason. Tomorrow we have an
appointment with them and their friends from Long Beach are going to accompany
us to the lesson. I'm so excited and I hope it breaks the ice for them to
progress towards accepting the gospel. Also we taught Jose again this week and
he for certain he needs to be baptized but he's not fixed on a day yet. He's
coming along he's just been stressed out with his health and working on selling
the house. We did service for him on Friday to clean his back porch and help
him assemble some screen for his windows. Super fun. Then on Saturday we when
to a ward baptism for a young girl in our ward, Elder Low baptized her. Alicia
one of our solid investigators come to support as they are close family friends.
Afterwards we tried to set a baptismal date with her but she still doesn't want
to commit to a date. Grrr. but she will be baptized soon. Anyway,
Things are just going great here. I'm loving the mission right now. Great new
things to come! I can't wait!

Missionary Quote of the week: If you treat a man as he is he
will remain as he is, but if you treat him as if he were what he ought to be
and could be, he will become what he ought and should be. –Goethe

It's the truth we must see everyone as sons and daughters of
God and they must be treated as such. If we want to help our friends to become
more Christ-like, we must act Christ-like to them and be an example of the believers.

I hope you've
all had a great week! Sorry I didn't email yesterday, there's been some changes
in the transfer system in the mission. Because of the influx of new
missionaries, the Mondays before transfers become normal work days and we receive
the transfer call that evening. Elder Low and I will staying together for
another transfer. Then the Tuesdays before transfers will be p days, so that is
why I'm emailing today. The mission is starting to figure out how to do things
more smoothly so things are starting to get less hectic. I'm excited to work
with Elder Low more because we have a lot of good things coming our way. But I
really loved last week because we were able to go sightseeing again but this
time in Palos Verdes. I swear its paradise over there with beautiful views,
mansions, and the weather was absolutely perfect! I sent some pictures home.
There's one view that I was able to view the whole city of LA. It was funny to
look over the past area I've served in. It was a start to a great week. Later
that night we held a Family Home Evening with Cynthia and her family. She has 5
young daughter so we had to make it interesting. We ended out singing some
primary songs like Snowman and it got everyone excited. We played a fun game
called the Spirit game where someone hides a piece of candy in the room and
some has to look for it blindfolded. Everyone in the room yells at them to tell
them where to go but most are telling in the wrong direction. There's only one
person who actually tells them the right place to go. Sometimes the people know
who it is and sometimes they don't. But it really helped Cynthia help her
family learn how to listen to God telling them the right things to do. They are
an awesome family, but unfortunately they couldn't come to church because their
whole family is down with the flu. I hope you can send out a prayer for them.
Then on Wednesday we got a surprise breakfast given to us from a referral we received.
Her name is Senorita Merida and she's from Mexico, but she learned about the
missionaries by watching the PBS documentary about Mormons. She said she cried
when it told about the missionaries that serve and she's wanted to find some of
us so she could feed us. She cooked us some mean pancakes and sausage. I was to
die for. Apparently she's an seventh day Adventist, but has admired the work
that we do. She's quite the knowledgeable lady with a wonderful family. She was
a teacher in Mexico and she's quite the reader especially about European
history. She chewed our ears of about the Vatican and the Spanish Inquisition,
it was quite entertaining. I'm not sure how receptive she would be to us
teaching her, but she's quite the opinionated woman. We hope to stop by again
soon. But missionary work is going great with investigators coming to church.
Things seem to be running smoothly. I'm loving it. I love my Ward Mission
Leader because of how missionary oriented he is. He's given us a referral every
time we come over. Unfortunately he's not been feeling well and work is super
stressful. Send a prayer out to him as well. Well until next week!

It's been quite
another eventful week again here in North Lomita. Probably one of the most
successful weeks I've had in the mission. On church on Sunday, we had about 8
investigators at church which is the most I've had at church before. The
members in the ward have been great in befriending everyone and having great
lessons at church. We had a break through with Cynthia's family as she and all
her 5 kids came again plus Nicole and their mother! Which I was super surprised
to see her mom there. We had a lesson at Cynthia's house and her mom was
visiting. As we were reading 1 Nephi 10 with Cynthia, she came in and started
listening. She's quite an interesting lady who has had, I guess you could say,
an "exciting" lifestyle. Cynthia would always say "she needs God
more than I do, and that's saying something." She had a lot of questions
about the church, so we gave her a summary of what we believe and she seemed
very stunned as we said it. She said that she was coming to church, but Cynthia
didn't believe her. They ended up coming to Gospel Principles and Nicole and
the mom said the prayers. It was very surprising. It was an inspired lesson at
church because our ward mission leader Bishop Madrid taught about eternal
marriage, because Cynthia, Nicole and their mom need to get married. I finally
think it's gotten them to understand. Hopefully we can make wedding plans this
week. Maria Garcia also came to church, the referral we received from
mormon.org, and we didn't know if she would be able to ask off work, but she
did. Hermano Rodriguez got her a ride to sacrament and the relief society
president gave her a ride to work afterwards, she's being befriended very well.
I had 2 really good lessons this week. One with Jose Morales who is the old man
with one leg. This week he was concerned about his health because he went to
the doctors to test if he had cancer in his esophagus. While we were reading
the Book of Mormon, the doctors called and said he didn't have it. He looked so
relieved, and he felts grateful for the chance to talk with us. He feels God is
blessing him for listening. He would have come to church if he didn't have an
open house because he's selling his house. Lastly, we had a lesson with the
Castillo Family. The mom and their 2 kids are members, but not the father
Miguel. We had splits and Elder Benhke came in to my area. He has an awesome
story as he's a convert as of 2 years ago. He's from Minnesota, but the
missionaries taught him when he was in Utah for school. He has the strongest
testimony I've ever heard in my life of Christ and the Book of Mormon. Anyway
we had a family home evening with them, but at first Miguel didn't come out of
the room for the lesson. I was praying at the beginning that he would come out
because the goal was to initially teach him. While we were playing a game,
Miguel came out of his room and starting listening. Their came a point in the
lesson when Elder Benhke taught the atonement super powerfully and Miguel
really felt the spirit testify to him that it was true. Elder Benkhe then
invited him to be baptized, and he accepted. His wife got a little emotional
because she's been working on him to be baptized for a while. It was cool too
because he invited him to be baptized on Feb 17 which happened to be his
birthday. WHAT! He says he will try because he's got some bad habits he needs
to get rid of. It was by far the best lesson I've been a part of. I have a
testimony that people can change when we strive to help them and invite them to
do so.